


Love Beyond Words

by maria_j_harper



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Minor Violence, War Games (Paintball)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-20
Updated: 2015-09-29
Packaged: 2018-03-13 21:16:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3396599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maria_j_harper/pseuds/maria_j_harper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That cliched soul-mate AU where the first words your soul-mate will say to you appear on your body.</p><p>Everyone gets their Soul-Mate's Scrawl on their eighteenth birthday, and Rose is trying desperately not to be excited about it. Yet her eighteenth birthday comes and goes, and nothing appears.</p><p>Kanaya is ashamed of her Scrawl: <i>I'm so, extremely sorry!</i> She doesn't need pity from anyone. </p><p> Vriska is convinced that her Scrawl is some kind of sick prank. As if her soul-mate is going to be salmon who talks entirely in fish puns! ...Whoops, she means someone.</p><p>Meenah Peixes rebels against the status and responsibilities given to her as the daughter and heir apparent to Crocker Corp, but she can't seem to escape the batter-witch's influence.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Collision

**Author's Note:**

> Based on the soul-mate AU wherein the first sentence your soul mate will say to you appears emblazoned on your skin when you turn 18. I call them Soul-Mate Scrawls, because it sounds cool, and because “tattoo” implies some kind of choice.

You celebrated your eighteenth birthday party in the usual fashion: your mother throwing you an ostentatious and over-the-top party. She took you out on the town to do some of the things you could now legally do- she bought you a pack of cigarettes, took you to a casino, found some random stupid political thing for you to both vote on, all culminating in a couple of long hours spent in the one (crappy) alcohol-free strip joint she could find in a fifty-mile radius. She’d been taking sips from a flask she kept in her bra the entire time, refilling it as needed from the limo’s mini bar.  
Now that you’re home though, she’s sent you into the bathroom with the simple repeated instruction, “go look!”  
You leave your purse on the counter and shed your dress easily. You check all the obvious places for some scrawling words.You’re not sure what to expect, maybe it will be just some mundane “hello,” but you are a bit excited, in spite of yourself. There’s nothing there. You take off your bra, than your underwear. You check over every inch of your body, even turning in front of the mirror and twisting your neck around so you can see your back.  
Your name is Rose Lalonde, and you’re starting to think that there must be something gravely wrong.  
“Hey Mom, what time was I born?” you call out.  
“Um… some time around seven I think? Or was it eight?”  
You retrieve your phone from your discarded purse. 12:26, if it was going to appear, it should have by now. You double check. Nothing.  
You suppose you shouldn’t really be all that surprised, after all, it wasn’t as though everyone could get to have someone to love and cherish them forever. Probably for the best anyways, you don’t know of anyone who could handle being in a romantic relationship with you. You’re no expert, but you somehow doubt that verbose, sarcastic girls who speak like every sentence is a move in a long game of chess and psychoanalyze every response are considered big catches really. It doesn’t hurt that, of the fifty percent of the population you could potentially find attractive, only about eighteen percent is going to find you attractive. You don’t always have to get bullied for being gay for it to make your life harder.  
Well you know what? What the fuck does it matter? You don’t need anyone anyways! You’ll just be an aromantic cat lady, who writes, and maybe does psychiatry as her day job.  
You get dressed, resolved to not feel sorry for yourself, not even a little bit.  
Your mother waits expectantly. “Well…? What does it say? What does it say?” She bounces up and down on her toes, like she’s the one who just turned eighteen instead of you.  
You sigh. You don’t want her pity, her " _oh, my poor baby!_ "'s. “It says ‘Excuse me, can you tell me how to get to the library?’ It could be anyone.”  
“Well… when you meet her, you’ll certainly know how to answer her question!”  
“Not if I’m in a place I’ve never been before.”  
“Oh, but then you can be lost in the city together! That’s totes romantic!”  
“Mom-” You stop yourself. “I’m tired. I think I’m just going to go to bed, okay?”

* * *

Over the next few weeks, you make frequent trips to the public library, which gets you no small amount of teasing from your mother. Unbeknownst to her, you’re researching other instances of Soul-Mate Scrawls turning up blank.  
You’d always known that the system wasn’t perfect. Scrawls might fail to appear, for example, if your soul-mate was also your childhood friend, and they’d said their first words to you long before the scrawl appeared. The other, sadder option was if the person who was supposed to be your soul-mate died before you met them.  
You, personally, never fully subscribed to the whole “soul-mate” thing anyways. Just one person, destined to be the single person you would love for the rest of your life? That was just naive and stupid, some archaic idea for people with some weird romantic nostalgia for contrived rom-com plots.  
You can’t spend whole days doing research anymore though, because you're about to start college. In fact, you're on your way home with several recently checked-out assigned preparatory readings for starting your classes, nose already buried in Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams, when someone collides with you.  
The girl had been going at some speed, and hit you with enough force to knock the book out of your hands, and send you both sprawling on the ground. You yelp in an undignified way that you would certainly deny having done, were anyone to ask.  
The girl, about your age, with short dark hair that flips up stylishly, scrambles on the ground for scattered books and papers, hers and yours indecipherable in the jumble.  
“I’m so, extremely sorry,” you say in your most ingratiating tone. “Here, let me help you with that.”  
She ignores you, and hands you your books. When you help her gather her papers, she smiles gratefully. Your eyes finally meet, and suddenly it’s as if something’s knocked the air out of your lungs. She’s gorgeous. Her skin is porcelain, and her face is regal, but kind. She looks like the kind of queen who really could rule a kingdom through sheer love and loyalty alone. Her unfairly curvaceous hourglass form doesn’t hurt. Her eyes are a deep forest green, like nothing you’ve ever seen.  
“With eyes like yours, one would think you would be able to see where you were going.” The words are out of your mouth before you have a chance to think them through. Damn!  
She blushes, which -who would have thought it possible?- makes her even prettier, and makes an apologetic hand gesture that looks like you ought to recognize it. She’s mouthing ‘sorry.’  
Then, before you can really appreciate her, she’s gone, back to dashing off to wherever it was she’d been rushing towards in the first place. You start to pick yourself up off the ground, when you notice an iPod that isn’t yours. She must have dropped it!  
“Hey, wait! You dropped your iPod! Hey!!!” you shout, standing and waving.  
Either she doesn’t hear you, or she's in too much of a hurry to care. She keeps running, turning the next corner and dashing out of sight.

You suppose you ought to have turned the iPod in to the library’s lost and found, or maybe the police, but you didn’t. You kick yourself for this a bit as you lay stomach down on your bed and examine it for clues. You finally turn it on, hoping to find at least some sort of hint for how to find her again. Not that you're interested in her, of course, dating someone who couldn’t be your soul-mate is kind of a social taboo, just that you need to return this iPod. Appleware is expensive, after all!  
You put in the ear-buds, and scroll through her music. Experimentally, you play a song at random and- WHOA!  
Whatever you’d expected when you plugged yourself into the fashion-sensible girl’s flower-cased music player, getting your ears blasted off by heavy metal rock was not one of them. Clicking the volume WAY down, you browse around a little more. It’s not all metal, but it’s definitely all loud, with strong drum sections heavily featured. Funny, she looked like such a classical kind of girl. Just goes to show, you suppose.  
You go to the library frequently, trying different routes sometimes, but if she’s there then you’re simply not finding her. You move in to your college dorm (you’d decided not to go to an out-of-state college after all, choosing one pretty close by), and meet some interesting new people at orientation week, but it’s not until classes actually start that you finally spot your illusive mystery woman in the least expected place.


	2. Communication

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Looks like I'm doing that cheesy romance novel thing where all the chapter titles start with the same letter. Sorry, I'm just not that great at names.  
> On the bright side, now we get to find out what's up with Kanaya!

You look again at the perfect cursive scrawl on the inside of your arm. _I’m so, extremely sorry!_ As always, the words fill you with the urge to laugh and cry all at once, because of course, what else would they be? What, besides pity, could drive someone to chose spending their life with a deaf girl?  
Your name is Kanaya Maryam, and you are currently indulging in the rare luxury of feeling sorry for yourself. You don’t let it happen often, you could never be happy if you did. No, most of the time you’re happy, sewing or gardening or reading or learning, but right at this moment you’re not. You allow common sense to get thrown to the side for a time and just let yourself be sad. You suspect the sudden downswing in your mood to be hormonal, and make a mental note to make sure you have pads.  
You’re in the school’s cafeteria. College cafeteria food might not be great, but as with most of its other aspects, it was a vast improvement over high school. Your current location is the only reason you’re not crying. Public sobbing tended to attract a lot of unwanted pity. You don’t want to have to explain yourself to anyone right now, thank you very much.  
So you’re surprised, and a little annoyed when you see someone coming to sit across from you at your table. Then you’re surprised, as you realize that you recognize this someone as the girl you accidentally ran into a while back. She’s smiling coolly, as though she just recognized you and wanted to give you a hard time again for what happened, but something in her eyes seems triumphant, as if to say “Yes, I finally found you!”  
You suppose you should find it odd that you’re having much the same sentiment. You nod at her, and then focus back on your food. Your lip reading isn’t the best, but looking back, couldn’t she have said something like “I’m so, extremely sorry?” It was potentially the right context… but no, it couldn’t be her. Could it? Perhaps… the more you consider it, glancing up at her, the more probable it seems. It just feels sort of… right.  
Her mouth is moving! You focus on her (black lipstick) mouth, trying desperately to decipher meaning from rapidly changing shapes. Then she ducks away to look at something she is retrieving from her pocket, and all hope of decoding her words vanishes like so much smoke. Fortunately her meaning becomes clear as she produces an object you recognize as your iPod.  
You snatch it up, checking its (unmarred) screen for any cracks. Finding none, you beam up at the girl. You touch your chest and gesture outward, twice to show how grateful you really are. _Thank you, thank you very much!_  
She’s smiling, but she looks a bit confused.  
You point at her, and then twirl your index fingers around each other. _You sign?_  
Her look of confusion deepens.  
You sigh, and retrieve a pen from your backpack. You wouldn’t do this, except that she’s rather extraordinarily pretty, and she did return your iPod. You feel like you owe her, at the very least, the benefit of the doubt. You pull a brown paper napkin from the dispenser and write. _Thank you for returning this! Sorry, I don’t talk._  
It isn’t that you hadn’t wanted to speak, hadn’t tried. It had taken almost an entire year and two speech therapists before you’d just given up on trying to talk with your mouth. It always felt so clumsy and unnatural, and you’d known that no matter how much you tried, you could never get it to sound “right.” You can’t stand it, the thought of your mouth creating these ugly, malformed sounds that are supposed to be words. You can be so much more articulate with your hands!  
You love sign-language, it’s yours, literal poetry in motion.  
“Oh, you’re deaf? I’m sorry, I should have realized. I don’t know much sign language. I think I learned a little when I was younger, but I’ve forgotten most of it. Let’s see…” She pointed to herself, then, pointer and index of each hand extended tapped her fingers together like a plus sign. Then, clumsily, she found the letters of the sign alphabet she was looking for. _My name is R-O-S-E._ She struggled most with the S, making a T at first, before correcting herself.  
You smile encouragingly. _My name is K-A-N-A-Y-A._ You sign slowly, as though speaking to someone with a hearing impairment… hah. You think Rose also catches this little irony, as the corner of her mouth slides up into an amused smirk. You add a gesture of interlocking index fingers, the plus sign again, and a semi-circle from the top of your nose to the bottom with the letter K. _My friends call me Nosey-with-a-K._ It’s common for ASL speakers to receive nicknames like this, involving some attribute they possessed and the first letter of their name.  
Rose clearly doesn’t understand this, but watches your hands intently. “I’m going to be honest, I have no idea what you just said. I know your name is… Kanaya? Am I pronouncing it right? Wait, that’s a stupid question. Sorry, I’m usually more articulate than this.”  
 _Being articulate is sexy._ You smile, knowing that she couldn’t possibly know what you just said, though perhaps your expression gave away more than you would care to admit, because a single raise of her eyebrows is speaking volumes. Verbose, purple prose of epic proportions resides within the simple facial gesture.  
“How do you say ‘hope?’”  
You cross your fingers with both your hands. Then you add, _Sign is really intuitive._  
She signs back, still with the stiff difficulty and sloppiness of a child, _I hope to see you… again?_ “Is that how you say again?”  
You shake your head and show her the correct sign. She’d been saying something like “tomorrow,” only wrong.


	3. Complication

Your name is Rose, and you're not sure, but you think you might be glowing, like having a crush has somehow turned you radioactive. When you get home, you tell your mom you want to learn American Sign Language. You abhor requesting her help, but sometimes if you want something done efficiently and well, you need to go to the people with the resources. Within the week your mother has purchased you what must be every ASL book known to man, and a special tutor from an all-deaf school, who was more than happy to spend his vacation time getting paid ten times his normal salary. Under his friendly and gentle guidance, you soon outgrow what you now realize to have been rather childishly simple speech.

You remind yourself that you’ve always had an interest in ASL, it just took some spurring, say, a hot deaf chick, to get you to put in the necessary effort. You are not doing all of this for her, she just happened to be the catalyst is all.

It is nice to see the look on her face when you finally find her again, and you wave her over. _Do your friends really call you Nosey-with-a-K? Personally I would have gone with Style-Girl._ You do a fluid spelling of ‘style’ with one hand, while signing ‘girl’ with the other. It’s a difficult combo move that you may have been working on for a while now. You admit to nothing!

_You… you can talk!_

_You seem surprised. More than talk, I can understand! Not everything though, I’m still learning._ Tenses and plurals in sign, for example, are mostly implied through context, it’s a part of ASL you’re still having trouble getting used to.

She immediately shoots off a series of rapid-fire signs, face excited.

You hold up your hands. You slide a flat hand along your arm, mime picking something up, and then use a flat hand to cut your forearm in half. You finish with a generic gesture towards her. _Whoah! Slooow down! I got about half of that._ Sometimes you really have to love the literal-mindedness of sign-language.

She smiles. _Sorry, I got excited. I didn’t think you knew how to sign, the last time I saw you, you just looked confused._

 _I only started learning…_ “How do you say ‘recently?’” you ask, making sure to annunciate.

She waves her hand over her shoulder. Oh, you guess that makes sense. Then she makes a hook out of her index finger and presses it against her cheek.

“Wait, which one is right?”

She makes a gesture like she’s dusting this ridiculous nonsense off her hands. You make a note to remember to ask your tutor about exactly what it means, but you get the general idea.

 _Ok,_ you sign.

_You don’t need to sign to me you know, I can read lips._

You’re not sure you caught every word of that, but you got the gist. _I’m sure you can, I just wanted to be… I’m sorry, I keep doing this._ “How do you say ‘polite?’”

 _Never apologise for learning!_ She signs assertively. _You don’t need to be-_ wait, was that the sign for polite?- _Just do whatever makes you comfortable._

You make the universal maybe sign of weighing your hands. _Maaaybe… someone should try making you, um, comfortable for a change._ You stumble as you mimic the sign she’d just used with you, and it comes out slow and forced. You must seem like an utter imbecile.

Nonetheless, the sentiment has the desired effect, as a bright shade of pink tints Kanaya’s face. Suddenly though, she looks up, as though seeing something interesting just past your- WUMPH!

Shoulder.

A tall, slender girl intercedes between you and Kanaya, wrapping her in a tight hug. When she lets go, she starts signing to Kanaya so fast you couldn’t eavesdrop if you tried. You try not to feel too crushed when she kisses Kanaya twice on each cheek, and then, chastely, once on the lips. It wasn’t as though you’d really hoped for anything much, just… it was sort of the perfect answer to your situation, wasn’t it? Your soul-mate couldn’t have a scrawl if she didn’t talk, right? You’d been foolish to get your hopes up.

The girl seems to notice you. _You deaf?_ she asks bluntly.

You shake your head. _No, just a friend of, um, Kanaya._ You hesitate, before using the nosey-with-a-K sign to refer to your… acquaintance? You’d called her a friend, but you don’t actually know her that well.

“Nice to meet you, friend of Kanaya, I’m Vriska.” Her voice is odd, like she’s speaking with her mouth full of marbles. The sign she uses to refer to herself doesn’t resemble “Vriska” at all. You tuck that sign away in your little store of words to ask your tutor about.

 _Are you two… together?_ You don’t know the sign for soulmate, so you settle for something a little simpler.

Kanaya signs as Vriska speaks, both saying “Sort of. It’s complicated.”

Ah, so they were probably dating, but not the Perfect Match. “Well, it’s been simply lovely, but I’m afraid I have to get to class.”

Kanaya grimaces. Me too. She makes a curt gesture that you don’t quite catch.

“What was that?”

 _J-O-Y,_ she spells, and repeats the gesture. you realize that the gesture involves making a J with a pinky out O, and then going out to a Y. It's a very sharp motion that contrasts sharply with the meaning. It's almost as if it's... yes, it definitely is! It's sarcastic!

 _I didn’t know sign-language could be-_ “Sarcastic?” You feel no shame for asking this time, this is an important word for you to know!

Both her hands made what in other contexts would have been the signs for “rock on,” one at her nose, the other in front of her, and the first goes from her nose to cross behind the other. _Sarcastic. Yes, of course sign can be sarcastic! What kind of shit language would it be if it couldn’t? No language of mine, certainly!_  
Your smile broadens. _I’ll see you later, ok?_ You’d like to stay and chat, but you really do have to go to class. Also, you know, she would probably eventually get sick of you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so the idea for this fic came from one with a similar premise, but also very different. The "coming up blank" idea is all me, and I just had a really interesting time figuring out why that would happen. As for why I chose Rosemary for this idea, as opposed to Meulin and Kurloz, which might fit better, honestly it was just a matter of how confidant I felt about writing the characters. Maybe if I knew them better as characters, I might ship them more, but as it stands, Meulin/Kurloz just isn't my cup of tea.


	4. Cosmic Jokes and Other Reasons the Universe Sucks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's chapter four, about time we met our final protagonist, no?

_It’s crazy, right? You think I’m crazy, don’t you? It’s just… she’s so smart! And… I think she might have learned to sign just for me? And she’s pretty, and sarcastic, and I just want to know more about her! I want..._

Your name is Vriska Serket, and if you have to swallow any more of this sappy nonsense, you might puke.

You watch your girlfriend’s hands fly through the air with only mild interest, and seriously consider just tuning her out. Now that it’s just the two of you, you sign freely. When you're with her, its actually kinda cool being one of the only two deaf girls at this school, it’s like you and she have your own personal secret language that no one knows but you. The rest of the time it's a hassle, but oh well. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? You’d sat together at lunch after her class ended, and she’d almost immediately started babbling. When she finally seems to run out of words, you sign as patronizingly as possible. _Kanaya, there is no such thing as a soul-mate! I, of all people, should know this! You’re just kidding yourself._

_Vriska, I know that you took it kind of hard when your personal slave- I mean Tavros- left you, but just because you haven’t found your soul-mate yet, that doesn’t mean I can’t find mine!_

She’s leaving you no choice. You pull up your sleeve. Your scrawl is on your upper arm. You’ve thought a few times about getting it tattooed over, but you don’t think any shop would touch it. Messing with scrawls is kind of one of those things you just don’t do. _You’ve seen my scrawl, right? It’s like some kind of great big cosmic joke! You used to think that about yours too, remember? “I don’t need anybody’s words of pity on my body!” Your words, not mine! And mine isn’t even sad, it’s just… this series of bad, nautically-themed puns that somehow form a sentence! I thought we had a pact! Are you really going to break our Screw The Soul-Mate Scrawl Pact just to pursue some maybe/possibly/probably-not soul-mate?_

_Not break it, no! Just… we agreed we could see other people if we wanted to, didn’t we? I believe your words were along the lines of “Come on Fussyfangs, you can’t keep someone as great as me all to yourself! That would be selfish!” I’m not leaving you, just playing the field a bit, alright?_

You flash her a grin that’s all teeth. _Alright? Kanaya, I’m proud of you! You’re finally starting to be more like me!_

She laughs.

Aw, your little Fussyfangs is growing up! It could almost break your heart. What you feel instead is this sinking sort of sensation of getting left behind. Is it just you that has this big joke on your arm? Like, an actual, literal joke? She kisses your cheek and heads off to her next class, leaving you alone with your frustration simmering on high heat, minutes from boiling over. You want to kick something. You want to pick a fight.

That girl with the extra long braids looks like she might put up a good fight if you hassled her. Who knows, kick up enough of a fuss and you might even get yourself kicked out of the cafeteria! That would make a nice story, wouldn’t it? Maybe you could finally stop living under Great Grandma Aranea’s shadow and make some legends of your own!

You make like you’re taking your plates to the dish carousel, and deliberately jostle into her, stepping firmly on her foot. “Whoops, sorry, guess I didn’t see you there,” you say, hoping your voice conveys your sarcasm. You sneer, just to make sure the real message is carried across.

Like you’d hoped, the girl turns towards you and straightens her stance, making herself look bigger to prove she’s not afraid of you. Filed teeth glint sharply like a shark’s as she snarls “Beach, I’m not shore you reelize the porpoisition you’re in!”

Looking back on this moment, you will be surprised that you weren’t dumbfounded, or elated, to finally actually see those words, that you didn’t make her say it again, just to make sure you read her lips correctly. Who would have thought anyone would ever actually say “porpoisition?” Instead, all you feel is anger.

You grab one of her braids and tug viciously. You think it’s the least she deserves for taking so long, for being the kind of fucking bitch that speaks to her soul-mate in puns, for looking like such an utter badass of indescribable hotness, for the eyebrow ring that makes her look like she’s always challenging you, even when she’s not, for the fact that you haven’t said ten words to her, and you’re already half way in love. Fuck her for that! Seriously, who gave her the right?

Distaining to resort to your “girl fight” tactics, your soul-mate hauls off and punches you in the face. You see it coming, enough to brace yourself, but you’re not prepared for the sheer force in her fist. You get knocked backwards, and fall gracelessly to land flat on your back.

You roll yourself up to the balls of your feet by curling in your legs, using the equal and opposite reaction of your body to rock yourself forward. Once on your feet, you catapult yourself into her gut. You can’t resist smiling as she coughs, wind knocked out of her. You both fall this time, but you’re on top. Your elbow finds her ribcage, her knee finds your side.

Then, as suddenly as the fight started, it stops, with several pairs of hands grasping you firmly by the shoulders, pulling you up to your feet and off of her. You notice that the hands are sleeved in blue. You turn around to see badges, hats, and mostly overweight faces. “Ma'am, we’re going to have to ask you to come with us,” one policeman says.

You can feel the braided girl’s smirk, until he looks at her. “You too, Miss.”

* * *

“You have the right to an interpreter.”

“I don’t need one.”

“It would make me feel more comfortable.”

“Well officer, I live to serve.” You have a sneaking suspicion you know who they’ll bring in. You do not, after all, possess all of the luck the way you once thought you did.

“I’ll go tell the sergeant then. You two behave yourselves.”

You and the other girl are handcuffed to opposite sides of a long table. The campus police, used to underage drinking busts and stolen purses, didn’t seem to know what to do with the two of you. The official reason for your arrest is creating a disturbance and public misconduct, since neither of you have expressed any interest in pressing assault charges. That could still change though, and you know exactly whose head the shit would land. You picked that fight, and there were a few dozen witnesses to prove it. It’s time to get humble.

“Sorry I stepped on your toes. I was in a bad mood,” you admit ruefully. “I’m Vriska, by the way.”

“Meenah,” she responds, fiddling with her cuffs. “Guess I cod have handled it better. Aranea’s always tellin me I shoald use words ‘steada just punching first and asking questions later.”

“I’ve got a cousin named Aranea!”

“No wave! Bookish girl, glasses, loves the sound of her own voice?”

“That’s her! You’re friends?”

“The best!”

You pause. “I’m glad you see it that way, about the fight I mean. I was afraid I’d have to throw myself at your mercy not to press charges.”

“Throw yourshellf at my mercy? I might still like to sea that!” She’s laughing. You got her locked up in a little white room, and she’s laughing! Man, this girl couldn’t hold a grudge if she tried, could she? Not like-

The door bursts open, and you look up to see that your interpreter has arrived. It seems the universe has some dramatic timing to go with its sick sense of humor. Terezi Pyrope stands in the doorway, grinning like it’s her birthday, and someone suggested a game of Blindman’s Bluff.

“Why Vriska, I thought you were staying on the right side of the law these days!”

“If there was any justice in the world, I would, and if you ever cared about me at all, you will go back and tell them you can’t work with me.” You don’t have the energy to play games with the ghost of ex’s past right now, you’re covered in bruises, and your worldview has been altered. Now you just want to take a nap. Or maybe talk to your soul-mate alone some more. Point is, what you don't want to do is deal with your former partner in crime's bullshit.

“Aw, but where would the fun in that be?”

The police officer came back into the room. You stand up. “Wow, Officer Dumbface, just woooooooow! You brought the deaf girl a blind interpreter! What is this, a comedy sketch? Wait, wait, I think I’ve seen this movie! It’s a terrible, unfunny movie that not even Gene Wilder’s world of pure imagination could save!” You wish you were lying. John’s cinematic taste strikes again.

“I don’t need to see sign-language to speak it! I promise, this will all be very professional.” Terezi might be a bit more convincing if she would drop that shit-eating grin of hers.

You notice Meenah waving at you, and you realize she must have said something while you weren’t looking. “You’re deaf?” she repeats.

The corner of your mouth goes up. “Well, yeah. What, you thought I talked this way because I have Down’s Syndrome or something? The difference between ‘my tongue is too big for my mouth’ and ‘I have no idea how I sound or how to sound normal’ is a thin one, takes some practice to hear it. Or at least, so I’m told.”

“Honestly, I thought my punch mighta messed you up.” She looks up at the cop. “Look, we already apologized and sorted fins out like civilized people. Nomobey drew blood. If you’re gonna give us a slap on the wrist, can you please just hurry it the fluke up so we can go home?”

“It’s a judge who would decide that, not me. But yes, I suppose you can go home.”

“Wait a minute! What exactly happened? I do not enjoy being left out of the loop, people!” Terezi protests.

“Actually, I have a question for Meenah. I was hoping to ask you when we were alone, but if we’re just going to go our separate ways, I have to know. What the fuuuuuuuuck is up with those fish puns?”

“Fish puns are cool. Why you got a problem with them?”

You don’t like beating around the bush, it’s a bunch of horseshit meant for flighty broads. You sigh. “Let me rephrase that.” You try to pull up your sleeve all the way up to your shoulder, but your cuffs give you a bit of trouble. "Wait, fuck I got this. This was supposed to be a dramatic reveal, damn it!" You finally get it up, and show her your scrawl, a word-for-word copy of what she'd first said to you. “What the fuck is up with all of the fish puns?”

“Guys!” Terezi waves her hand frantically. “I feel like I’m missing something here, what just happened?”

Ignoring her, Meenah is just staring at your scrawl. “...Oh. Sorry boat that. I work at the local aquarium. I’m this… mermaid princess typa character, put on a show for the kids. Fish puns just sorta harpoon, and it’s finpossible to get rid of them. Not that I’d want to, fish puns are great!”

“You wouldn’t think so if you were stuck with like five of them on your arm. I thought it was some kind of joke.”

"I can sea how that'd suck bilge, yeah."

You shrug. “Maybe hanging out with you will make them grow on me.” You're not sure with her dark skin, but you think you might catch just the hint of a blush.

The policeman is looking rather flustered, realizing that he really doesn’t belong in this moment. Terezi, having worked out what was going on, has gone back to grinning like the dragon that ate the valiant prince. The policeman clears his throat and offers to walk you two out of the station.

“In a sec, you got a pen?”

He gives you a pen. You find a bit of paper in your pocket and write your number. “Here. Call me some time. If you don’t, remember that I do have connections. I can get your phone, address, and date of birth from Aranea if I need to! It may take some torture to get it out of her, but I feel the ends justify the means.”

She grins, and god, she’s such a badass, isn’t she? You hardly even need the bruises she gave you in your fight to tell you that, the smile says it all. Everything just... fits. Like you’re meant to be, two halves of the same coin.


	5. Condescension

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meenah mulls things over, and figures things out.

Your name is Meenah Peixes, and you’re pretty damned sure you just met your soul-mate. It’s too bad you won’t be able to see her again. Although, at least this way, you haven’t had time to fall in love with her yet, so you’re really saving yourself future pain.

A town car is already parked just outside the college campus police station, waiting to take you home. You walk up to the passenger side window, which rolls down to reveal a stern look being sent at you by the chauffeur. You flip him the double bird. “I’ll walk.”

You have a couple of clips that you use to pin up your braids, even though it makes you look like Pippi fucking Longstockings. You’re only willing to clean so much dirt and trash out of your braids every day, and since they drag on the ground, it’s a real issue. Unfortunately, you are not a comic character whose braids drift out behind her magically, or stay clean through Comic Logic.

You try to think about other things as you walk, but Vriska just keeps barging back into your thoughts, as recklessly and rudely as she’d barged into your life. You feel like the leg where you have your scrawl should feel weird, different in some way, but everything seems to be as it was. Except that suddenly everything’s changed.

Not that it was love at first sight or some other bullshit you don't believe in, just that you could easily see yourself falling in love with her. Which is why you’re staying the fuck away from her. You hope Aranea won’t be too peeved with you, but she’ll understand, won’t she?

You can hear the Crocker Corp board member’s stuffy, anal-retentive voices now. “Blah, blah, company image, blah, blah wholesome values. Miss Peixes, we realize that as you are a young teenager, you are obliged to go through a rebellious phase, but please understand that there are limits to the allowances Crocker Corp can give to you. As the heir apparent, even a defiant one, you enjoy certain privileges and amenities that you will cease to receive if this kind of behavior persists.”

Yes, that’s precisely the kind of language they would use, and in all that shitty jargon they would manage to convey once again the message: “Fuck around too much, and you’re fucked.” The worst thing you think is the bit about you being a teenager. While they rarely openly express them, their opinions of you are quite clear. You hate condescension, you really, really hate it.

Crocker Corp, after all, was founded on Christian values! A teenage phase of eyebrow piercing and petty crime was one thing, but being an open lesbian? You’d get disowned before you could make a pun about it. Meenah Peixes would be discontinued and pulled from the shelves, no more nice things, no more safety net. You’d never admit it to anyone but yourself, but you’re scared.

You get home late, and Feferi greets you with a big hug. “Heya sis!”

“Hey there you little glubber, how’s life?”

Your younger sister chatters happily about her day, and you smile indulgently. However, you can only take so much of Fef’s effervescent enthusiasm. You excuse yourself up to your room. Feferi would probably make a better Betty than you, considering her personality. Or maybe your cousin Jane, with all that business savvy of hers. Not that either of them would wish for your disownment, but maybe it would be for the best.

Maybe you’re just selfish.

Maybe you’re scared.

Maybe… there’s another way?

* * *

“Hey mom, you know how you were thinking boat planning one of your charity drives soon? I got a couple ideas for the cause.” You do your best to sound casual. Feferi looks at you with genuine curiosity, while your mother looks more like she’s expecting you to suggest she sell her shaved armpit hair for the Locks of Love Foundation. She should know better, you never use the same joke twice!

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Sea, I met this deaf girl today, we kinda made friends. Maybe you could do somefin boat that? There’s all kindsa shit deaf people need: hearing aids, finterpreters, teachers who sign, I did some research and they could really use the money.”

Her mouth tightens in thought, and you’re sure she’s become suspicious, but then she smiles. “That’s a wonderful idea Meenah! I’m so glad you’re finally becoming invested in the company! We’ll start development right away! Let’s see… how about ten percent of every Crocker purchase goes to the National Association of the Deaf, for the next… eight months? Yes, that sounds perfect!”

“Make it fifty.”

“What?”

“I said make it fifty. Ten percent’s hardly anything! Make it fifty!”

“Sweetheart! We still need to make a profit! If fifty percent of the sale price is going somewhere else, it will cost more to make the products than we’ll make selling them!”

You hate it when she calls you sweetheart, but it’s time to pick your battles. “Maybe for findividual products, but not for bass-produced stuff, and what we lose in money, we’ll make up for in brand PR. For ten percent, people would rather just give to charity out of their own pockets than buy shit from us. For fifty, the public will glubbing love us.”

“You make an interesting point, but we still can’t do fifty.”

“Fine. Twenty five.”

“That’s still a painfully thin profit margin, sweetie.”

“I think it’ll be worth it.”

Her Imperial Condescension looks you up and down, and then nods. “Alright Meenah, you’re going to run my business some day, I’m going to have to start trusting your judgment. Twentyfive percent it is.”

“Also, the drive should be ten months.”  
“Hahahaha! No.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short introductory chapters will stop happening soon, and then actual plot may in fact appear! Finally, after all this time. Rose and Kanaya will probably just continue to be a cutesy will they/won't they type of thing, but Vriska, hammy drama queen that she is, will not stand for her own love story to be so boring, I promise.  
> Also, yeah, probably going to need more than eight chapters at this rate. That was always a conservative estimate anyways.


	6. Combat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> PAINTBALL!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I haven't updated in so long, I've just been super lazy and uninspired. *sigh* The first few chapters are always the easiest, now the actual WORK begins, and *ugh* _work_ am I right?

Your name is Rose Lalonde, and you have never been so out of your element. It’s a dark, brisk evening and you are wearing what basically equates to a bullet-proof jacket, hiking boots, headphones, and just the hint of a smile. Kanaya motions for you to cover her, she’s going in. You nod, and peer up over the top of your nice, cozy hide-out wall. You spie two separate glints of moonlight reflecting off of rifles in the dark.  
You look back at Kanaya. Your sign-language is still painfully limited, but you manage to say, _You go out, they pop up, then I get them?_  
_Why would they pop up?_  
_To get a better shot. They don’t know I’m not dead, and if you make it hard for them to hit you…_  
_How do I do that?_  
Spending too much time talking is making you nervous, and you pause to scout around to see if there’s anyone- yup, on your left, someone scurrying low to the ground towards your spot. You bring your rifle to your shoulder and paint him red. He falls to the ground, and stays there.  
_Change of plans, I’m the bait, you’re the mousetrap._  
_Why?_  
_Because, my good Kanaya, I have ninja skills._ You flash her a grin, and before she can say anything else, you’re over the top. You fire a shot at one of the glints, just to make sure you have their attention, but it seems unnecessary as you are already drawing their fire. You bob and you weave, you drop into a roll and stick to the shadows. Light here is your enemy. One wrong move and your silhouette’s a sitting duck.  
You feel more than hear shots fired from behind you, and one of your opponents’ rifles goes still. You spot a bush, partial cover, and dive for it. Safer than before, you feel comfortable enough to lay down some fire of your own. You’re not sure who finishes the other person, you or Kanaya, but you’re certain their armor is spattered red.  
You could learn to enjoy paintball, you think.  
You feel a sudden movement behind you, and you turn around to see that Kanaya has just gunned down an enemy on your flank without you noticing. You make your way to the shelter you just cleared out together, tacking hard whenever the ground around you exploded in a spatter of yellow paint.  
Damn, you really wish you could take off these headphones so you could hear what was coming, but that would be against the rules.  
You’d been really excited when Kanaya had invited you along to this Deaf Awareness Week event, but you hadn’t anticipated the way that silence amplifies fear. Being hunted, without being able to hear what you can’t see is a bit terrifying, if you’re being honest. Good thing Kanaya’s got your back, or you’d be screwed.  
You look out over the top and cover her while she follows your advance. You two are so close now, you can practically taste victory. Capture the flag, get it back to your own base, and you win the game. It’s taken you forever just to find where they hid the damned thing, but you know it’s somewhere nearby. This many people don’t guard nothing.  
From this position, you’re vulnerable to attack from the other side. It’s time to get moving. Kanaya gestures to you, and you follow her without question. You two crouch low to the ground and creep slowly out into the open. You see no combatants. You take a deep breath, telling yourself to become the shadows. That’s what people with ninja skills do after all, right?  
You spot a runner to your left, someone from your team, and he goes down in an explosion of yellow. You freeze, but whoever got him doesn’t seem to have seen you yet. You keep moving, low and slow.  
A figure jumps out of the bushes, and you can feel a scream leap from your throat, but you can’t hear it. The figure is barely a silhouette in the dark, but you can see the paintball gun swinging in your direction. No room for thought, you shoot them in the chest. You think you spot a rueful smile from them as they fall dramatically to the ground.  
Kanaya picks up her pace. Walking low to the ground like this uses muscles in a way you’re not used to using them, and you’re getting tired, but you do your best to keep up. Fortunately, you stop and rest when you stumble on the cover the guy you just shot had been using. It’s just a little foxhole, barely big enough for the two of you, but close proximity to Kanaya is hardly something to complain about.  
Then she waves at you. _I’m hit._  
You look at her in confusion and she shows you some yellow paint on her fingers. _I got shot in the gut and didn’t notice. Looks like you’d better go on without me._  
_What is this, a b-rate war movie?_ You demand. _I cannot go on without you, there’s no one else I trust!_  
_But you must! My love you must live on! You must fight on! Win this wretched war, for the both of us!_ She’s barely holding back laughter, you can tell.  
_Very well, I shall win this battle. And then, sweet lady, your death shall be avenged!_ You have no idea how to sign “avenged,” so you just mouth the word. Also, “shall” is the same sign as “will,” just with more gravitas and flourish.  
Kanaya breaks out into silent giggles, or maybe they’re silent, you can’t be sure. You want to say something else, ask if perhaps the lady might give her brave hero a kiss before you depart, but as you go to make the signs, your hands hesitate, and then fall back down. You try to regain your nerve, but before you can, she pecks you on the cheek.  
You’re sure your face must be glowing, you’re blushing so hard. _Um, thank you?_  
Kanaya grins. _Now fly, brave hero of the Red Team!_  
You get to your feet, and take off running. You spot the flag, and make a mad dash for it. You might not have much stamina, skinny twig girl that you are, but you can sprint pretty well. Then you feel a blow to your back, and you flop down on your stomach (ouch!). You roll over to see the flag guard give you a friendly salute. _Nice shot._  
_Ah! A talking dead person! she jokes._  
_Smartass._ You aren’t sure how to sign this one, so you just spell it out.  
_That’s Meulin to you, noob._  
Hopefully you won’t be stuck here for too much longer, but at least you have someone to talk and practice signing with.

* * *

Your name is Meenah Peixes, and you fucking WIN at this game! You stand back-to-back with Vriska on the red/yellow boarderline, shooting every Red in sight. You’re cackling like a madwoman, and even though no one can hear it, your filed teeth probably look terrifying in the twilight. “WOOOO! HAHAHA! EAT PAINT, SUCKERFISH!”  
Eventually, the Reds all either get smart, or get dead, and the pair of you advance into enemy territory. Vriska is every bit as enthusiastic as you are. She nails a guy right in the middle of his head guard. “Boo-yeah, SCHOOLED!” she says, clapping her hands and posturing. You laugh.  
“How do you say ‘schooled’ in sign?”  
“Just like this!” She repeats the clapping gesture.  
“Oh!” Well you feel kinda dumb now. You make yourself feel better by schooling (clap clap) another red-uniformed loser. You make it to the flag site with almost no opposition. Well, none of note anyways.  
Vriska nabs the flag, while you take care of the two remaining guards. You cover her retreat and you return to your base as fucking heroes.  
The game over, a big flare goes off to let everyone know they don’t have to pretend to be dead anymore. You grin at Vriska. “We make a pretty good team, huh?”  
“What team? That was all me!”  
“That was all you? Come on, I wasn’t going to say so, but that was clearly all me!”  
She shrugs, but you can see her fighting another smile. “Whatever, call it a team effort if that’s what makes you happy.”  
“Thanks for finviting me, I had fun.”  
A woman with a notepad materializes from the crowd of paint-covered people congratulating each other. “Today’s event was in part sponsored by the National Association of the Deaf, and Crocker Corp. As the winning team champions, would you like to say a few words about either organization?”  
You take a step forward. “Okray, listen up. For the NAD, I got nofin but respect, they’re some reely great people, but for Crocker Corp I have just one thing to say, and that’s a big old fuck you.”  
“But Crocker Corp was what allowed this entire event to have this kind of scale and equipment.”  
“Maybay, but do you honestly think that they actually care? Schooner or later, everybody’s going to reelize that everyfin’s just branding for that batterwitch.”  
“Well if that’s true, eight cheers for branding, I say! This was the best paintball game ever!” Vriska interrupts. “And don’t you think that my opinion should matter a little more, since I’m the one who’s actually deaf here?”  
“That’s some impressive lip-reading young lady! Did you really get all that from a profile read?”  
“Nope! No idea what Meens here just said, but she was standing like she was mad. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out the general idea.”  
“That’s still really impressive!”  
“It’s just a skill you pick up when you’re deaf. You’ve gotta use visual cues to help you understand. People aren’t always going to spell things out for you. Slang, moustaches, mumbling, there are all these factors that make lip-reading really fucking hard. Meenah talks half the time in fish puns! You think that’s easy to read?”  
“So you must really appreciate these events then, to help people understand the hardships you go through?”  
“Seriously? I don’t give a fuck whether other people understand or not. I like these events so much because they’re fun, and they’re comfortable. No one’s “disabled,” or at least, everyone’s got the same handicap. Hell, in this place, I get to be the hero with the advantage, because I know how to operate without my ears! It feels good, and as you might guess, it’s a feeling that doesn’t happen often.”  
You grin as you listen. Wow Vris, heap on the drama much? But at the same time, you get where she’s coming from. You’d see it that way too. You can see you’ll be getting time with her no time soon, the reporter looks like a fisherman who’s just hooked a whale, and Vriska is basking in the attention. You start to go, until you hear the reporter say your name.  
“So is Meenah your date this evening then?”  
“Yup. We met just a while ago, but it was pretty clear we were soul mates.”  
Oh.  
Well.  
You suppose you could run away.  
But since when has that been your style?  
Instead you saunter back over and put your arm around her shoulder. “What can I say? She took my breath away as soon as we met.”  
Vriska gives you a look, somewhere between surprise and “I can’t believe you just said that.” But then she snorts and bursts into a fit of giggling. “That’s right, and Meenah had me falling head-over-heels for her the moment we locked eyes!”  
That sets you off too. You start laughing too, the kind of laughter that shakes your shoulders and leaves you short of breath. You can see the reporter looking… a bit concerned. “It’s a finside joke,” you pause to explain, before laughing some more.  
“Well that’s a very sweet story,” the reporter says, and uses this opportunity to make her escape.  
“We totally freaked her out!” You tell Vriska, but this just makes you both laugh more.  
You finally sober up a little when a pair of girls come over to say hello to Vriska. You feel like you know them. You figure it’s because you’ve probably passed them in the cafeteria a couple times or something. Vriska sure seems happy to see them, and she greets one of them with a peck on each cheek. You’re not really the jealous type, but this girl is wearing a red paintball outfit spattered in yellow paint, and she somehow manages to look like she’s ready to walk down some runway in Paris.  
“Kanaya!” Vriska’s hands start signing rapidfire. Kanaya responds in kind. You figure her date must be a hearing person too, as she is watching the conversation like she’s watching an exciting sport that she hasn’t quite figured out the rules to.  
“Hey, figured I shoald introutduce myshellf. I’m Meenah.”  
“Oh! Pleased to make your acquaintance. My name is Rose.”  
“Oh, you’re that gill who’s alwaves going on these big long analytical tangents in my lit class, yeah?”  
“That description could certainly be used for me, yes. Mrs. Cunningham’s Literature In Time?”  
“Yeah, that’s it! Gill, if we ebber got you ‘n’ Aranea in the same room, there’d be a literal explosion of exposition. Like, the kind with casualties, except insteada shrapnel, we’d all die of boredom.”  
“I will take that under advisement, and avoid her accordingly.” She smirks sarcastically, and you give a little chuckle of respect.  
“So, you Style Girl there’s plus one?”  
She glances away at the ground. “...Maybe. Apparently she and Vriska are an Item, though not an exclusive one, so I’m still sort of working out where it is I stand.”  
Well then.  
Where the shell does that leave you?


End file.
